National Pasta Day is today!

About National Pasta Day

Pasta has a long and partly uncertain history. The National Pasta Association, the US industry's trade group, says forms of it are believed to have existed in ancient China and Greece, that pasta dishes appear in Italian recipe books in the early 1200s, and that eating it was widespread by the 14th century. In the United States, the association credits French immigrant Antoine Zerega with opening the country's first pasta factory on the Brooklyn waterfront in 1848, using a single horse to power his machinery and drying the strands in the sun. The trade group itself traces back to 1904, when manufacturers formed the National Association of Macaroni and Noodle Manufacturers of America.

No founder or founding year is documented for the October 17 date, and it has no government status. The National Pasta Association acknowledges it in its October materials: a 2021 toolkit for National Pasta Month notes October 17 as National Pasta Day and October 25 as World Pasta Day, and suggests members post about both.

World Pasta Day is a separate, international observance on October 25. It is organized by the International Pasta Organisation, an association of pasta makers from many countries, together with the Italian food industry group Unione Italiana Food, and is marked with an annual gathering of pasta makers, institutions and food writers.

Sources: National Pasta Association: National Pasta Month Toolkit (2021, PDF), National Pasta Association: History of Pasta, International Pasta Organisation: World Pasta Day. How we check dates.

How to mark National Pasta Day

• Make fresh pasta at home with flour and eggs, and roll and cut it by hand into tagliatelle or pappardelle.
• Cook a dried pasta shape you've never tried, such as orecchiette, bucatini or farfalle, and match it with a sauce that suits it.
• Learn to finish pasta in its sauce with a splash of the starchy cooking water, so the sauce clings to every piece.
• Host a pasta potluck where each guest brings a dish from a different region of Italy or a different noodle tradition.
• Donate boxes of dried pasta and jarred sauce to a local food bank, where shelf-stable staples are always useful.

National Pasta Day dates